DIGITISER
  • MAIN PAGE
  • Features
  • Videos
  • Game Reviews
  • FAQ

THE DIGITISER Black Friday LETTERS PAGE

29/11/2019

9 Comments

 
Picture
Because you demanded it... this Sunday... Beanus returns - along with actual gaming content!!! - on the Digitiser channel. And he's interviewing James Interactive, creator of The Legend of Bum-Bo, and Edmund McMillen, who you might know as the person behind Super Meat Boy and The Binding of Isaac.

Given that Edmund is a genuine games industry legend, quite how this has come about I'm not entirely sure, but the video is... the best and worst (in a good way) of Digitiser in one utterly ridiculous package. We know we've hit our sweet spot when we've created something that is guaranteed to annoy a whole bunch of people. 

I'm feeling oddly festive already this year, and we've got a whole load of "holiday" treats lined up for you in the run-up to Christmas, including a bumper Christmas episode, featuring a host of guests and surprises.

No doubt helped by recent appearances from Ashens, we've had our best month on the channel since Digitiser The Show came out. We're very close to achieving 15,000 subscribers, which is a figure I struggle to get my head around, not least that it was slow-going a few months back, when we first moved away from always talking about games.

Suffice to say, we'll be investing plenty of energy into the channel and videos going into the New Year. Sorry if you hate them!!!!!

​Let's do some letters.


If you'd like to appear here, or you've something you'd like me to give some attention to in our occasional Plug Zone, or you've got a picture of a bin you wish to share, please send your filthy emails to this place here: digitiser2000@gmail.com​​​​​​​​​​​

Read More
9 Comments

OPINION PIECE: OPINIONS ARE JUST OPINIONS

28/11/2019

22 Comments

 
Picture
I may have already described my slightly pertinent experience with getting Rage 2 up and running. Three hours it took me to try to install the game on my PS4, before I gave up and just bought it via Stadia. I was playing within minutes.

Blah blah blah, and thanks for the backhander, Google. 

No, this isn't another Stadia-just-works polemic, but that does factor into it. This is more about why it's really important to believe, above all others, your own, first-hand, experience. And even then... take what you think you believe with a pinch of salt. 

You see, I'm really enjoying Rage 2. I'd liked the first one quite a bit, though I associate it with an odd time in my life, when I had just come out the other end of a long marriage that hadn't exactly worked, and I appreciated the chance to lose myself in its wasteland. 

I bought Rage 2 upon release, with a view to reviewing it on here, but the other reviews I read put me off. I was busy earlier this year, and fitting a big open world-game that was barely just sort of okay, into my free time wasn't something I found particularly appealing. So I left it in the shrink-wrap, until last week.

​And while I'm glad that the game has gone beyond my (admittedly very low) expectations, thanks to that lowering of this expectations due to others, I'm annoyed I ever allowed opinions to influence me.

Read More
22 Comments

THE REAL REASON PEOPLE HATE GOOGLE STADIA

25/11/2019

34 Comments

 
Picture
I did a review of Google Stadia on Friday, having given my initial impressions over on Twitter. As I wrote in the review, I got a lot of... let's charitably call them "comments", from people who insisted I was either an idiot, or lying, or wrong in some way. People who, broadly, hadn't used Stadia, but who were of the unshakable belief that it doesn't work.

I've issues - quite significant ones - with what Stadia offers at the current time. The selection of games doesn't exactly 'wow', they're overpriced, and it all feels very bare bones. However, the technology - the thing which so many people told me, back in the summer when I first wrote about Stadia, wasn't going to work - does work. It works great. For me, at least. 

Now... it's important to stress that it might be that Stadia doesn't work great for everyone. Certainly, I know that Digi2000 contributor SuperBadAdvice hasn't exactly had a seamless experience with it. However, my first impressions continued to be backed up by my personal experience over the weekend, to a point where I forgot I was streaming the games.

Honestly, I had a sudden moment of realisation while playing Rage 2 (thus far, an underrated game that I can't believe I put off playing for so long) where I remembered, and was stunned. I'd been playing for hours with no noticeable lag, no stuttering, and graphics that, if they aren't 4k (the naysayers insist that Stadia upscales its visuals), as close to 4k as to be irrelevant. 

We can get into the whole not-actually-owning-your-games debate another time. I just want to talk about why so many people are still insisting that Stadia doesn't work, in the face of evidence to the contrary. Why are they trying so hard to convince themselves, without any first-hand, experience, that their belief is right? 

Let's take a look at that.

Read More
34 Comments

BIZARRE PRINGLES TASTE TEST

25/11/2019

0 Comments

 
Biffo and Ashens go down the tubes, sampling some of the weirdest flavours of Pringles from around the world. These may include "egg sandwich flavour"... 

Buy official Digitiser merch from our store: https://www.redbubble.com/people/digi...
0 Comments

REVIEW: GOOGLE STADIA

22/11/2019

 
Picture
The knives are out for Google Stadia, and I struggle to understand why. Or, at least, I struggle to understand the scale of the incoherent, frothing, red mist rage being directed at it. 

Yesterday I gave my first impressions of the service on Twitter, and dozens of utter dickheads, who don't even follow me, decided to chip in with their own unwanted opinions.

They actually searched for "Stadia" to have a go at random people. Who cares about any product so much that they'd actually do that?

I even got an un-ironic "OK boomer" from one of them.

It seems to be that the issues some people have with it - which, in all honesty, they've had since Stadia was first announced - are as follows:

a) You won't be able to store your games on a shelf, where you can look at them, and get turned on by them, until you die.

b) Google is a big evil corporation and ruins everything. 

c) Google Stadia could never possibly work.

d) Something to do with them stealing your data, or identity, or something. 

e) They just really, like, hate it, for reasons they aren't emotionally articulate enough to understand. 

Read More

THE DIGITISER FRIDAY LETTERS PAGE

22/11/2019

6 Comments

 
Picture
I don't usually do this, because I'm ashamed of it coming across like I'm begging, but if you ever wish to help Digitiser out, all of the money our Patreon backers support us with is ploughed back into the channel and this site.  

For example, I wouldn't have bothered buying Google Stadia otherwise, but I thought you'd want me to review it (which I will on Monday). And all the nonsense stuff we look at on the YouTube channel comes from our Patreon slush fund.  

In return you get exclusive blog posts and early access to videos, and you have peace of mind knowing that you're helping Digitiser keep going. I don't ask for more than about 70p a month for this privilege (though if you wish to give more, that's always an option). And if you don't like that idea... well, you can always by something on our Redbubble store.

You see, Digitiser isn't so much a business, as a collective endeavour that we're all in together, like a war. 

Goodbye! No - wait. Have some letters first. 


If you want to appear here, or you've something you'd like me to give some attention to in our occasional Plug Zone, please send your filthy emails to this place here: digitiser2000@gmail.com

Read More
6 Comments

KIDS SHOULD LOVE VIDEO GAME FACE PAINT, SO WHY DO ALL THESE KIDS LOOK LIKE SOMEBODY'S WALKED IN ON THEM HAVING A POO?

21/11/2019

6 Comments

 
Picture
Kids love video games. Kids also love having their faces painted, for some reason. This gallery of children sporting video game-themed face paint should demonstrate how happy these kids are; their faces should be a picture of joy and excitement.

Instead, for some reason they all look they've been interrupted while having a poo...

Read More
6 Comments

WHAT FIGHTING FANTASY BOOKS SHOULD'VE BEEN CALLED

20/11/2019

7 Comments

 
Picture
Fighting Fantasy role-playing books were massive in the 1980s, yet they're remembered as much for their striking covers - some better than others - as they are their actual written content.

​Here's a gallery offering some alternative titles based upon said artwork. 

Read More
7 Comments

REVIEW: DEATH STRANDING (PS4 version tested)

19/11/2019

9 Comments

 
Picture
Earlier this year, my wife and I went on a walk.
 
It's not something I do very often, but she loves walking, and every once in a blue moon I'll take one for the team and go on a walk with her. Obviously, I love spending time with my wife, but I find walking - for the sake of walking - a bit sort of, y'know, dull. Regardless, I was determined to prove how devoted I am by doing the walk in full, all the way up to Ivinghoe Beacon, whatever that is, from Tring Station, and back. A distance of just over 10 miles, up and down hills.

I can't say I enjoy the act of climbing a hill, but I do quite like the view from the top of hills. Frankly, it's a shame that escalators are not a natural feature. 

Unfortunately, a mile or two from the end of our walk, something popped in my knees, and I shuffled through the remainder in searing agony, stopping every few steps to wail and shriek, and complain. It must've appeared that I was attempting the equivalent of breaking a dish while doing the washing up, and consequently my wife has sworn off ever going on a walk with me again.

Which I wouldn't be able to do anytime soon anyway, as my knees still haven't recovered.

ANYWAY.

The point of all this is to preface this review of Death Stranding: the new game from heralded "genius" Hideo Kojima. Much has been written about its origins - and it has been fun (for "fun" read: "aggravating") to see games journalists attempting to up their game, and deliver a verdict/thesis that they feel is worthy of this work of high art.

A work of art which is full of product placement for Monster Energy Drink, where the only show on TV is Ride With Norman Reedus, which features a character called Die-Hardman, and co-stars talk show host Conan O'Brien.

Strip away all the eggy guff around Death Stranding - and there's a lot of guff of the eggy variety - and at its heart it's a silly open world game in which you play a sort of postman, who must deliver packages to remote communities in a post-apocalyptic America (which looks like Iceland, and where the only notable company still operating is Monster Energy Drinks). Thus: reconnecting the shattered country.

Yes, it's a walking simulator. And a balancing-packages-on-your-back simulator. And a lot of it isn't even a game at all, but a CGI movie. 

Read More
9 Comments

HOW TO DO MAGIC 3...!

18/11/2019

0 Comments

 
0 Comments

REVIEW: Star Wars: JEDI: FALLEN ORDER (PS4 version tested)

18/11/2019

6 Comments

 
Picture
Do you remember the Star Wars films? Do you? Do you remember them? What was your favourite bit of the Star Wars films?

My favourite bit of the Star Wars films was probably all those bits where the characters went sliding down a loooooooong slope. Because that happened a lot in the Star Wars films didn't it? Sometimes it felt like you couldn't go five minutes without Luke Skywalker or one of the other characters sliding down a slope.

They would stand at the top of a loooooooong slope, and then - whoosh! - off they'd go, sliding down it, unable to stop. It happened so often I don't know why they didn't just be done with it and call it Slide Wars!!!!!!

Sometimes though... sometimes in the Star Wars films... there'd also be some big, balloon-like plants, wouldn't there? There would be these plants, and the characters would jump on these plants... and they'd going... BOIIIIINGGGGG!!! And they'd be flung around the place, from one springy alien plant to another, like they were pinballs, or, I dunno... trapped in one of the lesser 3D Sonic the Hedgehog games.

Certainly, these are two of the main things people remember about the Star Wars films: the sliding, and the boing-y plants. Luke Skywalker and Han Solo leaping around, sliding and being catapulted about the place.
​
At least... this is what I am led to believe based upon Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order. 

Read More
6 Comments

THE DIGITISER2000 5TH BIRTHDAY FRIDAY LETTERS PAGE

15/11/2019

8 Comments

 
Picture
Has it really been five years since this site began? Well yes. Yes it has. No need to answer. It's a rhetorical question. Frankly, it even feels like five years.

Anyhow, to mark this arbitrary anniversary, and because I wasn't prepared enough to do anything more significant, it's time for a special letters page, in which I gave you all an opportunity to blow smoke up my cracksie - because who doesn't like that?

Ironically... Bert the chimneysweep doesn't like it. He doesn't like it at all.


If you'd like to appear here, or you've something you'd like me to give some attention to in our occasional Plug Zone, or you've got a picture of a bin you wish to share, please send your filthy emails to this place here: 
digitiser2000@gmail.com​​​​​​​​​​​

Read More
8 Comments

THE TERRIBLE BEST OF DIGITISER2000...!

14/11/2019

5 Comments

 
Oh man! We're celebrating five years of Digitiser2000, whatever that is! And here to mark the occasion I offer you a bunch of things that I've created over the last half-a-decade that represents a reasonable cross-section of The Best of That Stuff. 

Starting, of course, with the first proper episode of Mr Biffo's Found Footage, which you can click on above. I miss it. Maybe I'll do something in a similar vein.

WAIT AND SEE.

And if you like that, there's a whole load more of it here. It really should be the most popular thing of all time. 

Next...

Read More
5 Comments

FIVE GLORIOUS YEARS OF DIGITISER2000...!

14/11/2019

21 Comments

 
Picture
Five years ago this week... Digitiser was reborn. Well... sort of. To be honest, I never really saw this site as the actual continuation of Digitiser. It was always going to end up as a sort of hybrid between my old blog and Digi's reviews. 

What it gave me, at first, was an outlet for all the stuff that had been forced to stayed cooped up in my brain for the best part of a decade - and once the cork was off the bottle... well... you only have to look at the insane, three posts-a-day, schedule I was managing when I first started. I had a lot of itches to scratch. 

I did, in the early days, hope Digitiser2000 might take off in its own way, but I realised relatively early on that the site existed in a completely different media landscape to the one the original Digitiser launched in, back in 1993. To stand a chance of breaking through would've required me to kind of compromise on what I wrote, and I fast became aware that I didn't want to do that. 

Truthfully... we don't really get a lot of people reading these days, barring the occasional article which gets some interest outside of the core audience, though any disappointment over that has long since dissipated.

I've tried, on and off, experimenting, but ultimately I had to conclude that I needed to write what I wanted to write, and to hell with trying to compete for clicks, or making the entire point of this site in any way coherent and consistent. 

There have been times - even relatively recently - where I've wondered why I continue in the face of widespread apathy (blunt I know, but there's no real way of dressing it up as anything else), but I think I enjoy the structure it gives me. I like having a schedule to keep to, and I like the mental workout of having to think of what to write. 

And I like that there are at least some people who appreciate it. 

Read More
21 Comments

SPOILER-FREE REVIEW: THE MANDALORIAN & DISNEY+

13/11/2019

17 Comments

 
Picture
ATTENTION, Americans, Canadians and Dutch people... please pity the rest of us: you've got access to Disney+ four months before the rest of the world. Yes, I know the UK has bigger problems at the minute, but c'mon... we just wanted something nice.

Fact is, it means that Star Wars fans elsewhere in the world are seeing The Mandalorian before the rest of us. That sort of thing used to happen a lot when films were released in America months before we'd get them. Generally, we'd be none the wiser.

But then isn't now, and now we have the Internet, which means we've got four months of avoiding spoilers for the first ever live-action Star Wars TV series. What should've been a moment of celebration for Star Wars fans across the planet has instead given a lot of us the runs.

Disney's Bob Iger has made it clear that, post-The Rise of Skywalker, TV is going to be the focus for Star Wars, at least for a few years, and here's where that is meant to begin. So, I hope you'll forgive us for feeling aggrieved. 

Of course, it's not just Star Wars that Disney is pinning its streaming hopes on: it's also expanding its Marvel Cinematic Universe onto Disney+, with big budget shows featuring characters from the films. Those won't start arriving until next year, so for now there's only one of Disney's tentpole, movie spin-off, shows on the service from launch (unless you're a massive High School Musical fan, or desperate to see the tepid hidden camera series, Pixar In Real Life).

Apparently, it's a licensing issue that's preventing Disney launching in more than three countries, though based upon the issues users had connecting to the service on the first day, it might be as much to do with Disney not wanting to take on more than it can handle.

​Which is fine, but doesn't change the fact that Star Wars fans are a rabid bunch, and we live in an age where things need to be released more or less simultaneously around the globe, or they're either going to be spoiled.

​Or they're going to be pirated. 

In today's world, four months is forever, and I'll admit we're a bunch of entitled, spoilt, arseholes. We know what we want, and think we deserve it now.

Read More
17 Comments
<<Previous

    This section will not be visible in live published website. Below are your current settings:


    Current Number Of Columns are = 2

    Expand Posts Area =

    Gap/Space Between Posts = 12px

    Blog Post Style = card

    Use of custom card colors instead of default colors = 1

    Blog Post Card Background Color = current color

    Blog Post Card Shadow Color = current color

    Blog Post Card Border Color = current color

    Publish the website and visit your blog page to see the results

    Picture
    Support Me on Ko-fi
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    Picture
    RSS Feed Widget
    Picture

    Picture
    Tweets by @mrbiffo
    Picture
    Follow us on The Facebook

    Picture

    Archives

    December 2022
    May 2022
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    November 2020
    September 2020
    July 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014


    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.
  • MAIN PAGE
  • Features
  • Videos
  • Game Reviews
  • FAQ